Assorted Madness
by Alohilani
Summary: Fifty single-word prompts with accompanying writings. Now showing: Zim accidentally follows Dib into a haunted house.
1. 23 homesickness

A/N: I was tired of the usual fanfiction word/theme lists, so I asked people on Tumblr to give me fifty new prompts and I'm going to try to work through all fifty. Here's the first one.

I know stars don't really work this way, but, uhh… this show has a lot of weird nonscience in it, so let's pretend, okay? And parts of this take place during canon at different points (like when Dib says/narrates that he's never seen Zim eat, say that part is before the 'waffle incident') while parts of this take place after canon.

* * *

Dib lucked into this particular pattern.

He'd just happened to be observing directly the first month. The first month after the alien landed to the day, Dib was sitting on the roof of the house across the street.

He was watching the door and windows. He wouldn't even have _noticed _what was going on on the roof if Zim's voice didn't carry so far.

Dib started in shock when he heard it, and almost dropped the binoculars. He wasn't used to it. Hearing a mostly-human sounding voice and knowing it came from something that had been born lightyears away. Something green and bug-eyed and evil! A monster! A freak! And it was Dib's job to eradicate this evil before it- it- what was it saying?

"I said _be quiet!" _The alien sounded irritated. Maybe it was going to do something evil. Where was it? On the roof! Dib focused his binoculars. There was Zim and there was his little robot thing, bobbling around. Dib didn't quite 'get' the robot or what its job was supposed to be. It didn't seem that important, honestly. The robot seemed pretty stupid. It was just some kind of alien slave thingy.

Zim was sitting at the edge of the roof with his little legs dangling off, scowling with his arms wrapped around his body. He was in disguise and his horrible fake eyes were narrowed in malevolence. What dark thoughts lurked behind that gaze? What black evil filled that disgusting green head?

"If you fall off the roof I won't fix you," Zim snapped to his robot. What a jerk! He was even horrible to his own servant! How wretched. Dib couldn't wait to defeat this monster.

Also, gosh, Zim was loud. Dib could hear him way over here. Every word.

Zim was watching the sky. The hairs on the back of Dib's neck stood up. Could he be waiting for reinforcements?

The robot said something and Zim replied with "I already TOLD you, Irk's star is visible only one day a month because of some… planet… orbital… thingy- I don't know! But we're going to look at it!"

The robot nodded. Zim looked up into the sky and said something else that actually did not carry across the street. Dib would have to learn to read lips.

Minutes passed. Zim sat and waited, occasionally barking something at his robot. Fine. Dib would also sit and wait.

The clouds parted eventually. Zim bolted to an upright position, pointing into the sky. "THERE!"

Dib looked, but couldn't tell which star Zim was pointing at.

Zim nodded. There was a confident smirk on his face. "Home, GIR. In a few short weeks or so this place will be conquered and we'll be heading back!"

Dib quivered. Not if he had anything to say about it!

Zim sat there for a while longer, looking all- all smirky and confident. Dib was going to get him. Dib was going to get him good.

"HEY!"

Dib looked down to see a legless man on a lawn chair in the yard of the house Dib had chosen for his spying spot.

"What are you doin' on my roof, big head kid?" the guy yelled.

Dib ran.

It wasn't his fault this house had a perfect view of the alien's residence.

* * *

The next month Dib caught the ritual on a surveillance camera he'd set up in the house next to Zim's. It went pretty much the same as the first time, Zim sat outside, gave a little inspirational speech to his robot, watched the sky for a little bit, then went back inside looking invigorated.

Dib had caught on. He watched Zim's roof the same time every month from then on.

The third time, Zim came out alone. He sat in silence on the roof with his little digital notepad, writing all night. Probably an evil plan.

He was alone the fourth and fifth nights, too. On the fourth night he only came out briefly- stood on the roof for about an hour, standing there frozen and silent and squinting into the sky, and then going back inside. Dib watched the video feed the whole rest of the night waiting for him to come back, which was boring.

The fifth month Zim sat on the edge of the roof and ate a sandwich, looking sullen the whole time. The sky was overcast that night with no stars visible.

Dib had never seen Zim eat before and he spent the rest of the night wondering what was in that sandwich.

The sixth month, Zim brought GIR onto the roof with him. Dib reflected that he had now kept the Earth safe from this monster for half a year.

"We won't be able to see this again for another six months, GIR," he snapped. "So pay attention."

Zim was in an unnaturally foul mood, even for him.

"What's the matter, space boy?" Dib muttered, lying on his stomach on his bed watching the video feed on his laptop. "Taking over Earth not as easy as you expected? I wonder why."

Zim scowled into the sky, thumping his heel against the wall of his house. "There it is, GIR. Home."

"Wouldn't it be a shame if you never saw it again?" Dib said, laying his chin on his folded hands and narrowing his eyes.

Zim took a deep breath and let it out, folding his arms over his chest. GIR threw the toy he was playing with over the side of the roof and chirped "Oops! Oh nooo!"

They hung out there for quite a while. Dib eventually fell asleep on his keyboard.

* * *

Dib didn't remember the thing with the star six months later. He caught Zim going out to look at it because… he was watching Zim anyway.

He brought Skoodge with him this time instead of GIR.

"Yep," Skoodge said, standing a few feet behind Zim, who was sitting on the edge of the roof. "That sure is Irk's star. I guess you haven't seen Irk in a while."

Zim grunted. Dib realized that Zim had been on Earth for a year now.

"Huh," Dib mumbled, popping a piece of popcorn into his mouth.

"That must be weird," Skoodge said.

Zim grunted again.

"The month it took me to conquer Blorch was pretty hectic!"

"Go back inside!" Zim spat.

Dib chortled.

Skoodge shrugged. "Okay. It's pretty cold out." He headed inside.

Dib tossed a piece of popcorn into the air and tried to catch it with his mouth. It bounced off his glasses instead, leaving a greasy spot that marred his vision. "Man." He took off his glasses, cleaned them and put them back on.

Dib supposed he should hate Skoodge, because he was an evil Irken like Zim who'd apparently actually conquered a planet. He made a mental note to hate Skoodge.

Zim was sitting slumped with his elbows resting on his knees and his chin on his hands.

Dib leaned forward, folding his arms on his desk. "What are you thinking about?" he said. "Skoodge could do it in a month. You sure couldn't. Are you wondering what your deal is? Maybe your little friend is better at your job than you are." Dib felt the corner of his mouth quirking up into a smile. "Or maybe I'm just _awesome." _He tossed another piece of popcorn and tried to catch it. Success. He savored the salty crunch.

Zim looked pensive.

"Oh boy, you really are plotting something, aren't you?" Dib muttered. "I have a werewolf to catch this weekend, Zim. This better not waste all my time."

Zim sighed slightly. He got up and went inside.

Dib was pretty sure a Mysterious Mysteries rerun was on.

* * *

Zim went and checked on the star the next two months, but not the third.

Dib started to wonder about his whereabouts around midnight. He glanced out the window. It was a clear night. Not that that would have mattered- if it happened to be cloudy and Zim wanted a look at the sky, he would just stand on the roof and yell at the clouds. Or shoot at them.

It was a weekend and Dib didn't usually go to bed until 3 AM on weekends, so he headed over to Zim's house.

He knocked on the door.

"I knew you'd come crawling back," Zim said from inside.

Dib doubted Zim was talking to him. He opened the door.

"Not _you!" _Zim was sitting on the couch. He picked up GIR and threw him at Dib. Dib ducked and a giggling GIR went sailing over his head.

Dib walked into the living room.

"Get out," said Zim, not looking away from the TV.

"Were you expecting Skoodge?"

"No."

"Minimoose?"

"No."

There was a message stuck into the wall with a knife. Dib walked over and read it.

ZIM

IF YOU CAN READ THIS I MOVED OUT

IF YOU CAN'T READ THIS I ACCIDENTALLY SET YOUR BASE ON FIRE WHEN I STARTED UP MY VOOT SORRY ABOUT THAT YOU MIGHT BE DEAD IF THAT HAPPENED SORRY ABOUT THAT TOO!

I'M CHECKING OUT SOME OTHER STUFF ON THE PLANET

YOU STILL HAVE RATS IN YOUR BASEMENT

INVADER SKOODGE SIGNING OFF :)

Zim was starting to chuckle maniacally. The laughter built up to full-blown screeching.

"You killed him?" Dib guessed.  
"It was _I_ who loosed the rats into the basement!"

"That sounds pretty stupid."

"What do you think of _that?" _Zim demanded.

"Uh. Stupid?"

"He mooches off me for three months. Three! Then he just leaves without bidding me a proper goodbye to my _face! _He left rotting garbage behind, too! It's all over the basement!"

"Around here, that could have been anyone."

"Oh well, the rats will eat it." Zim tipped his head back and took a long swig from a slim, amber-colored glass bottle. Dib's eyes almost bugged out of his head. Then he saw it was labeled 'cream soda'. With an Irken logo under the 'soda'. Phew.

Zim wiped his mouth with the back of his arm. "Ungrateful pig. Eating my food. Habitating under my roof. I could almost-"

He threw his arm back, as if to fling the bottle. He looked at the bottle. He took another pull from it instead.

"_Did_ you kill him?" Dib asked.

"Nah I can't find him," Zim said.

Dib leaned back on one foot. He kept a close eye on that bottle in case Zim did decide to throw it. "What exactly was your relationship with Skoodge?"

"Henh?" Zim tipped the bottle upside down and shook it, frowning. He'd finished it, apparently. Dib didn't understand why people did that to empty bottles. They were making sure it was empty, right? If it turned out not to be empty wouldn't they be wasting the rest of the contents by tipping it over?

"Were you friends?"

Zim snorted. "No. Irkens have no friendship, Dib. We take no friends, no companions, no- egh- lovers. We have allies, servants and enemies. That is all!"

"Oh, okay. So him leaving isn't why you're not out there looking at your planet's star?"

Zim chuckled. Then he looked at Dib for the first time since Dib had come in. "What?"

"On the roof." Dib pointed upwards, and then thought maybe that gesture hadn't been entirely necessary to get his point across, because Zim knew where the roof was, but whatever. "You usually go look at it every month."

Zim cocked his head to the side, raising one antennae and observing Dib with wide oval eyes and his mouth in a neutral position. He looked curious. Intrigued.

Dib had been studying this alien beast for over a year now and he still didn't know what Zim was thinking half the time. Insanity could do that, he guessed. Zim's insanity, of course. Dib was not crazy. _Not crazy._

Zim was still staring at him. "What?" Dib asked finally.

"You know about that?" Zim sounded… civil. This was way creepier than rage.

"Yeah," Dib said. "I know lots of things."

"You've been observing me, huh?"

"Yeah."

Zim nodded. Still with that odd, calm expression, he smashed the cream soda bottle against the floor. He got up and headed into the kitchen.

Dib stood where he was for a minute.

He heard Zim screaming in the kitchen. Just… just screaming.

Dib left the base at a swift walk.

The next day Zim acted as if nothing had happened and claimed Dib was insane or lying when Dib tried to bring it up.

* * *

The next month Zim came out on the roof with GIR and Minimoose. He sat down and watched the sky. He had his maudlin face on. Oh boy.

Dib zoomed in the camera so he could observe the slightest change in Zim's expression. Zim did odd things when he was in this kind of mood. Zim also confessed a lot of things when he felt this way.

He watched Zim take in a huge, shuddering breath and let it out. "Well, there it is," he said.

"Yep," GIR said. "WHAT ARE WE LOOKING AT?"

Zim pretended there hadn't been a question. "You know, GIR. Sometimes I think…" He trailed off.

"What? Think what?" Dib demanded. (He supposed talking to a one-way video feed where the other person-or-inhuman-alien-thingy-that-wasn't-a-person couldn't hear him was marginally better than talking to himself.)

"Never mind," Zim said, putting his arm around GIR's shoulders. Dib wrinkled up his nose. Zim acting nice to his robots always seemed fake and gross and wrong. Zim was an alien, he wasn't nice. And the next minute he could be shoving GIR around and yelling at him.

They sat there like that for a while and then Zim gave GIR a little push on the back. A gentle push. For once. "Go inside, GIR."

"Okay." GIR headed back in.

Zim pulled his knees up to his chest and folded his arms on his knees, leaning forward. He looked small. He _was _small. He was shorter than Dib now. Dib had at first thought the alien was shrinking and wondered if there was something important going on. Then Dib had realized he himself was getting taller, as preteen children tended to do, while Zim- an adult of his species- was staying the same size.

Minimoose bobbed up and down in the air, smiling blandly. Dib had wondered a few times if he should take Minimoose out. He'd always decided not to. It was… it was just a floating moose. An evil alien floating moose, but… whatever… Dib would think about it again later.

"You know, Minimoose," Zim said in a tone that was so _very _casual it sounded totally fake, "sometimes I think I won't _be _going home."

"Nyeh!" Minimoose squeaked with a broad grin.

"Haha, yeah." Zim rested his chin on his folded arms.

"Why wouldn't you be going home?" Dib asked the screen. "Are you afraid of me killing you? Is that it? Are you sick or something? Are you going to go directly on from Earth to another innocent planet? You can't just live here, you know."

Zim sat bolt upright, lifting his head. "Wait!"

"Wait what?" Dib demanded.

Minimoose squeaked.

"Sweep the area for bugs and spy devices," Zim said, narrowing his eyes. "Dib knows far too much about my habits lately."

Dang.

Dib watched as Minimoose zipped around. The video feed filled up with an image of glowing red eyes. Minimoose squeaked, and the image went to static.

* * *

Dib wasn't able to observe Zim's roof next month, and he knew that the star thing was only visible for six months out of the year.

On March 23rd of the next year, Dib walked over to Zim's house. He climbed the secret ladder he'd installed in the back yard and went to the roof.

He saw Zim's back facing him. The little alien was sitting with his feet dangling off the edge of the roof with Minimoose sitting on his head between his antennae.

He looked like he might fall off if Dib startled him. Dib waited a moment.

Zim wasn't turning around.

"You need to learn when you're being watched," Dib said. Zim whipped around, staring. "Or maybe don't. I don't know. I don't know how you've even survived the last two years. I guess you lucked out, Zim, you found the only planet with a native population dumber than you are."

"Get off my roof," Zim said.

Dib took off his backpack. "Happy anniversary."

Zim was apparently too confused for words.

Dib sat down next to him. "So, you know what? I've seen you out here looking into the sky a lot but I never figured out where your star actually _is."_

Zim was trembling. "Explain!"

"Well, I've seen you pointing at it but-"

"What are you _doing here?"_

"Oh. Anniversary, you know, a yearly commemoration of an event. In this case…" Dib winced. "In this case… man. Meeting you is a terrible anniversary. I wish you'd never come here! What am I doing?"

"I don't know!" Zim frowned. "You're here to push me off the roof, aren't you?"

"I guess I could do that."

Zim extended two of those weird metal legs from his Pak and grabbed onto the roof with them. Just in case, apparently.

"I got you something." Dib took the wrapped present out of his backpack.

Zim looked wary. Dib handed him the present.

"I see now," Zim said. "This is why you're really here. To give me this thing. I won't fall for it."

"I was bored," Dib said.

"Uh huh."

As Dib had known would happen, Zim's curiosity got the better of him and he tore open the present.

"What-" Zim picked up the item inside and stared at it. "It's Zim."

"Yeah."

"Only… brutalized!"

Dib shrugged. The thing he'd given Zim was a voodoo doll that had not achieved the desired effect. Dib had kind of gone to town on it. Nothing had happened to the real Zim as consequence, but it had been fun.

"I don't… I don't understand," Zim said. "What is this madness?"

Dib stood up. "Just reminding you. I'm watching. Always watching."

"Okay? I knew that."

"And I remember everything. Bye. Have a nice night."

Dib started walking away.

Zim stared at his voodoo doll. "Wait!"

Dib turned around.

"I too have a gift." Zim rummaged through his pockets. "Uh- erm- not that- uh- HERE!"

He pulled out a wad of used gum.

"Okay," Dib said. "I don't really want that."

Zim crumpled some of the torn wrapping paper around the wad of gum and held it out.

"I don't want that," Dib repeated.

Zim looked irritated. "It's a 'gift.'"

"I don't-"

Zim threw the crumpled-up ball of gum and wrapping paper. It bounced off Dib's head and rolled around on the roof.

Dib took it, realizing that the chewed gum contained a saliva sample.

"Now get out of here," Zim said.

Dib left.

* * *

Zim did not watch the star the next month, or the month after. The legless neighbor had gotten used to Dib being on his roof at least. He watched Dib watch Zim.

Once he tried to make conversation. "You friends with the runnin', screamin' guy?"

"Nope," Dib replied, peering through Zim's window with the binoculars. Zim was on his hands and knees, scrubbing the floor. Come on, he had to have technology that could do that. Dib still didn't always understand Zim. Maybe some paranormal creatures just had thought processes that were inaccessible to humans, or maybe it would take another two years… of course, eventually Zim would be observed properly, in a laboratory setting…

"He does a lot a yard work, mmhmm."

"Mm," Dib said.

One day Dib took his usual post and the guy wasn't in the yard. Weird. He was always in the yard. Dib noticed these things.

The other different thing was that Zim was baking something. Dib had never seen him bake.

When the thing was finished baking Zim put his disguise on and crossed the street with the casserole dish. He knocked on the door of the very house Dib was sitting on.

Whoever was going to come to the door would be taller than Zim. Zim would have to look up to talk to them, and might notice Dib on the roof as he did so. Dib scrambled backwards out of sight.

He heard the door open.

"Screamin' runnin' guy!" a female voice said. "You live cross the street?'  
Zim had his fake social voice on. He at least sounded more natural with his neighbors now than he had after first landing. Not human, by any means, but less terrifying. "Yes, I do. I read the d- about your loss, in the obituaries. I've brought a ceremonial casserole dish."

"Your parents made this?" His what? Oh, right.

"No, I did."

"He watched you." The woman sounded choked up. "All the time!"

That got Zim's attention. "He did? When? What did he see?"

Dib tensed up. Zim was fully capable of killing people who'd seen too much. Dib might need to protect that woman.

"He loved to watch you do yard work," the woman sobbed.

"Ehhh…" Zim muttered. Dib ventured a peek over the edge of the roof and saw Zim rocking back and forth and the unfamiliar woman standing there crying. "Well, I don't want to intrude on your personal moment of grief and I should complete my homework but carry on, soldier, I'm sure you'll recover." Zim shoved the casserole dish into the woman's hands, turned on his heel and started trotting away. The woman just stood there crying.

Dib leaned over the side of the roof. "Psst."

The woman stared up at him in shock.

"Don't eat that. I watched him put octopus chunks in it," Dib said. He felt like he'd forgotten something. Oh. Oh yeah. "I'm very sorry for your loss."

* * *

The true end of the pattern came later.

The air was hot and heavy. Dib felt as if the humid weight was pressing the breath out of the lungs. He lay spread-eagled in the grass, staring up into the night sky.

Zim lay next to him, gasping with his tongue hanging out. His arms and legs looked absurdly spindly sticking out of the sleeves and shorts of his camp outfit. It was too big for him. This camp was for ages 14-16. Zim was shaped like a shrimpy eleven-year-old and apparently always would be.

"When are they going to come after us?" Dib asked.

Zim panted like a dog.

"It should be a while. People hate me and… you disappear whenever you want with no repercussions."

Zim nodded.

Dib stared up into the glittering sky. "I can't even see half these stars back home. Hey. You never told me where the star of your home planet is." He didn't really expect a straight answer now, but-

"I don't remember."

Dib sat bolt upright. "What?"

Zim was drenched in sweat. His sodden wig had come off, leaving human contacts but Irken antennae. "I don't remember where it is."

"How do you forget something like-"

"We still need a bus."

Right. They were successfully away from the camp, but had no way to get home. "We could hitchhike."

"Hrm."

"How do you forget where your home planet's star is?"

"Where's yours, _Dib?"_

Dib's eyebrows rose. "It's called the sun."

Zim blinked slowly. "Oh."

"How are you going to find your way home?"

Zim took off his contacts and laid them on his chest. "I was? You were supposed to take a _map!"_

"No! When you leave Earth!"

"Please! I have technology for that, Dib. Technology you can only dream of."

"Okay." Dib kept looking at the sky. He'd thought it was beautiful at home, through city smog. That was nothing. Camp Torture had almost been worth it for this…

Wait, he'd… just asked Zim how he was going to get back home.

Zim wasn't going home unless he took over Earth first and with Dib around he was never going to take over Earth.

"Never mind," Dib said.

"Never mind what?"

Dib looked over at his sworn enemy. Zim looked quite calm, almost contented. He was feeling pretty secure if he'd taken his disguise off.

"Just never mind," Dib said. There was a big rock close at hand.

Simple methods of killing the alien hadn't occurred to Dib in the beginning. He'd been convinced somehow that to take an extraterrestrial life the CIA had to be involved or something. He had no such illusions now, that rock would make short work of Zim's brain if he didn't avoid the blow in time, and he was sluggish from the heat and not expecting any aggression. Crush the head, get the Pak… the whole thing might only take ten minutes.

Dib didn't want to lug a dead alien home. Another stay of execution, then.

But it had been over two years now.

Dib would have to do something eventually-

Both of them jolted to a sitting position as an alarm sounded in the distance. Zim scrabbled for his disguise. This would be a problem for later.

* * *

Much later.

"I found it."

Zim peered up into his face. "What?"

The night was cool and breezy and Dib's trenchcoat fluttered around his legs. Crickets chirped in the grass. A dog barked somewhere down the street.

There was a yowl from somewhere inside the house. "I said _be quiet!_" Zim hollered over his shoulder. "I _just _fed you! And don't come to the door! Don't!"

"Your star," Dib said.

"What?" Zim squinted. He was wearing a gross tank top and boxers and his bathrobe. Maybe Dib should start checking to see if the alien was dressed before he came over.

"Irk's star."

"What!"

"There's a telescope set up on the roof of your house right now if you want to-"

"It's 3 AM!"

"You don't sleep, you have time."

Zim stared at him in disbelief.

"It'll only take a second," Dib said.

"If I look, will you leave? And not return?"

"Sure."

The breeze was stronger and less pleasant on the roof. Zim shivered theatrically and wrapped himself tight in the bathrobe as he looked through the telescope. "Yes. Very nice. It's a star."

"You don't even care? That's your home planet's star."

"I said it's nice!"

Ominous yelping noises were coming from inside the house.

Zim headed for the ladder. "Okay I'm going inside, get away from my house and don't come back!"

Dib looked through the telescope again. "Hmph," he said. Unappreciative alien. What was his deal? This was his home planet's sun. He didn't even care that Dib had found it? Dib would never say 'very nice, it's a star' if he was on Irk and someone had found Earth's sun for him. Dib would never forget where Earth's sun was to begin with! Space travel was wasted on the space aliens.

There was a thump and an explosion from inside the house. The roof shook. Dib started taking down his telescope. He had work in the morning. He should get to bed.

He headed out of the yard. He stopped just outside it and turned, narrowing his eyes. "You don't want to go home anymore, do you, Zim?"

There was no answer, because Zim was inside his noisy base and Dib wasn't a crazy alien who could be heard anywhere in the state.

"I'm not going to always find it inconvenient to kill you," Dib said.

It sounded ridiculous even to him.


	2. 38 vicarious

Dib spread out the picnic blanket and sat down on it with his legs folded underneath him. He pulled out his video camera, checked the batteries, double-checked the lens cap, and leaned forward, peering through the bushes.

He watched the pink dot in the sky grow bigger and turn into headlights. The Voot cruiser landed on the shore of the lake and Zim got out.

Toxic waste, Dib guessed.

Zim took a picnic basket out of the back of the Voot cruiser and set it down on the ground. His body was stiff and he was moving jerkily and scowling.

Toxic waste. Dib wriggled in place. He was going to open the picnic basket and pour toxic waste into the lake and Dib was either going to film it and then stop him, or stop him and then film it, or stop it while filming it. He hadn't figured that part out yet.

Zim opened the picnic basket (it was plain, ordinary wicker) and took out a blanket (it was plain, ordinary red plaid). He shook out the blanket and laid it out on the ground, strolling back and forth and picking out every little wrinkle with quick, mincing motions. He sat down on the blanket and twisted around glowering at the wrinkles his butt had made in the blanket. He started tugging out those wrinkles, pouting.

For crying out loud, it was just a blanket. On the ground. It didn't have to be perfect. Dib's own blanket was wadded up and muddy.

Zim exhaled deeply and settled into his spot. He looked out over the lake, frowning. He was very tense. Dib wondered if it ever made him sore, being that tense. His shoulders looked painfully tight.

The headlights of the Voot cruiser were on, and they turned Zim a funny pink color. Dib got his night-vision goggles ready. It would be dark soon.

Zim flicked his head around, his antennae angling into an alert position, as a bird tweeted somewhere in the forest.

"Just a bird," he muttered. Ha. Yes, just a bird... and all the while the real predator was sitting in the bushes with a video camera, just feet away! Silly alien.

Zim opened up the picnic basket and starting taking out little plates. He set out two little plates and adjusted them very carefully so that they were each centered in their little squares on the blanket. He took out two little forks and two little spoons and put them next to the plates, lining them up to be exactly parallel to the edges of the blanket. Exactly. Parallel. It seemed to take him hours. Just sitting there. Fiddling with the silverware. Every so often he stopped and turned his head towards some distant noise, freezing like a timid little woodland animal.

Oh come on. No toxic waste? Really? There was going to be _something _evil in that basket. Had to be.

Zim took out... a centerpiece. It was very ugly. Dib wouldn't call it evil, exactly.

And of course the centerpiece had to be exactly centered in its little square. Dib wanted to tear his hair out.

Zim sat on his heels, glowering. Dib realized that the ugly centerpiece couldn't be both centered in the square on the blanket and an equal distance between the two plates at the same time.

Zim turned around, glaring down at his own rear end. Moving around getting all the plates exactly perfect had made more wrinkles in the picnic blanket. Sheesh, no wonder he couldn't take over the world... well, besides Dib stopping him, of course.

Zim scowled at the little plates. Horror upon horrors, twisting around to glare at the wrinkles in the blanket had pulled it so that the plates weren't centered anymore.

It was fully dark now. Dib could see by the headlights of the Voot cruiser and the full moon... he might as well save the batteries in his night vision goggles.

Zim spent an eternity rearranging everything as best as he could. Finally he heaved a defeated sigh and turned towards the spaceship, calling for GIR.

GIR bounced out of the spaceship and strolled around the edge of the blanket. "Ooh," he crooned.

"Yes, nice, isn't it," Zim said.

Hm, so Zim had arranged all that stuff only to invite GIR over to, most likely, destroy it. There was a family of leprechauns Dib could have been watching tonight, but no, he had to pick the alien.

GIR clasped his hands under his chin, strolling around the edge of the blanket in the other direction. "Ooh," he repeated.

Zim nodded and found some tiny imperfection in the positioning of his fork to correct.

GIR sat down cross-legged across from Zim. There was a splashing noise from the lake and Zim swiveled towards it. His breathing was sharp with anxiety.

After a moment, after no lake monsters appeared (which Dib considered to have been an actual possibility), Zim shook his head and took two sandwiches out of the picnic basket. Each was in a plastic Ziploc baggy. Actually, it probably wasn't Ziploc, it was probably some alien brand. Actually, Zim could have gotten them on Earth, so it could be Ziploc. Actually, it didn't matter and Dib would stop worrying about it.

The sandwiches had to be exactly centered on the plates, of course. Dib ground his teeth a little.

"It looks so pretty," GIR said.

"Every time I think I've discovered every horror on this planet I discover something new," Zim said, apparently ignoring GIR completely. "What is that in the lake?"

"Fish?"

"Fish are in the ocean. There's a different kind of water in the lake." So Zim knew there was a difference between fresh water and salt water but not that both of them could sustain fish. Okay. Sure.

"Different fish?" GIR suggested.

Zim shivered. He looked in the picnic basket. "I forgot napkins. Eh, it doesn't matter." He picked up his sandwich and started picking the crust off of it. GIR swallowed his sandwich whole and then lay there on his stomach on the sand with his face propped in his hands, humming.

Did GIR actually have a stomach? The thought made Dib's skin crawl all over for reasons he couldn't fully explain.

Zim studied the little robot for a minute and then flicked his sandwich crusts at GIR. GIR caught them in his mouth.

Zim started picking at the now-crustless sandwich. His shoulders had relaxed somewhat.

Dib was getting a leg cramp.

GIR studied his silverware, which neither of them had used because they were eating freaking sandwiches. GIR reached out towards his fork.

"No," Zim said.

GIR turned the fork just a little bit.

Zim's shoulders tightened. "I'll smack you."

GIR returned the fork to its original position.

Zim set his sandwich back on his plate.

"Are you gonna eat that?" GIR asked.

"Nah." Zim looked out across the lake, then back at the sandwich. He picked it up and lobbed it at GIR, who caught it. Zim started picking up crumbs off his plate and throwing those too. GIR didn't bother to catch them.

"It's nice out," GIR said.

"It's a little cold," Zim answered. Picky. Dib thought it was nice out. "Well, I'd call that a successfully completed human picnic."

GIR nodded. "I learned so much," he whispered.

"Mmhmm. Sadly, it doesn't appear to have any offensive capabilities." What kind of offensive capabilities had Zim thought a picnic might have?

GIR leaned across the picnic blanket. "I want to play in the lake," he said in a stage whisper.

"Be serious, GIR! You have no idea what's in that lake." Zim started putting things back in the basket. "It smells bad. We should have gone somewhere else."

"You think everything smells bad!"

"I do! I hate it here!"

GIR huffed a little. "I want to play!"

"All right, fine." Zim picked up a nearby rock and threw it. "Go get the rock."

GIR squealed and ran down the beach. Zim continued to pack up.

Dib had officially wasted his evening.

GIR came back, holding a bone. "That's not a rock," Zim said.

"It's a bone!"

"I told you to get the rock!"

"Get the bone!" GIR threw the bone. It landed about a foot away.

Zim turned to look at the bone. "Me?"

"Get the bone!"

"I'm not going to get the bone!"

"Play fetch!" GIR sang.

"No!"

GIR shrieked.

Zim got up and trudged over to the bone, hanging his head. He picked up the bone and brought it back.

"There." He dropped the bone into GIR's waiting hands. "Are you happy now?"

"Smiiiile!"

Zim sounded downright offended. "No!"

GIR frowned. He sat down on the sand.

Zim picked up the blanket, shook it out and began to fold it into neat, even squares.

GIR started rolling around on his back. "I just want you to like me!"

Zim scoffed.

"You hate me!" GIR sniffled, then sobbed. "Why? Wh-whyyy-eeee?"

"Ugh..." Zim slumped. "I don't... hate you, GIR..."

Dib raised an eyebrow. He didn't, hm? Was that a potential weak spot?

GIR sat up, all smiles. "Then play with me!"

"Egh... no."

"Play!"

"GIR!" Zim threw his arms up into the air, dropping the blanket. "My brains are too awe-inspiring to find any sort of pleasure in picking up rocks."

"Then what do you like?"

"I like-" Zim abruptly stopped talking and let his arms fall to his sides. GIR cocked his head, waiting for a response. Zim rubbed his chin thoughtfully and then said: "I'm an Invader! An elite Irken soldier! It's not my job to like stuff, or have fun! I'm a finely honed tool of destruction! I cause death and mayhem wherever I go! That is all!"

"Ohhh," GIR said, nodding as if this explained everything.

"Yes." Zim put his hands on his hips. "Um... destroying. I like that. I like things. Okay." He picked the blanket and shook it out again. "Let's go home so I can shut myself up in the lab and be all alone and... uhm..." He scratched one cheek.

GIR ran down the beach, shrieking laughter.

"He'll come back," Zim said to himself, folding the blanket. Apparently the folding job wasn't good enough, because he unfolded the blanket and started re-folding it.

After his third time re-folding it he turned and snapped "GIR!" over his shoulder. There was no reply.

"He will return!" Zim announced, packing away the blanket. He closed the picnic basket and put it away.

Zim walked to the edge of the beach and looked out over the surface of the lake, putting his hands on his hips. It occurred to Dib that he could probably throw a rock and knock Zim into the lake... eh, not right now. If he missed or didn't hit him hard enough, there would just be a big fight.

"GIR!" Zim screeched. "GET BACK HERE RIGHT NOW!"

GIR's voice echoed down the beach. It sounded oddly muffled. "I'm hiding!"

"Ugh!" Zim shook his head. He stomped down the beach.

Dib had... actually not noticed where GIR had gone to. Bad. Bad detective. Very bad. He would have to really crack down on-

Something popped out of the ground with a plume of sand and Dib squawked and fell over backwards and Zim screamed like a stuck pig. Dib scrambled back into a sitting position and peered through the bush. Zim was rolling around the ground, squalling, and GIR was firmly attached to his ankle.

"GIR! You..." Zim went limp on the sand. His voice became eerily calm and clear. "Never do that again." Apparently he'd been screaming loud enough himself to not hear the noises Dib had made.

"Aw," GIR said. "You found me." He started dragging his butt around on the ground like a dog with worms. Zim watched him with a certain despairing downward tilt to his head.

"I'm a cat," GIR said. He pounced at something on the ground.

"Now what are you doing?" Zim sounded very tired.

"I'm catchin' bugs." GIR pounced again. "He got away."

Zim sat down on the sand. GIR grabbed at the air, spun in a circle and fell over.

"What bugs?" Zim asked.

"Those."

"Hm." Zim turned his head, watching something in the air. "Hey, there really are bugs."

GIR started poking at the air, seemingly at random. "I'm catching- I'm catching the- I'm catching the bugs. I'm gonna do it."

"No you aren't," Zim said. "That's not how you do it. This should be easy, GIR."

"Then you do it!"

Zim folded his arms over his chest. "No."

"Okay."

"Fine," Zim said. "If you insist, GIR, I will show you the right way."

GIR hadn't insisted this time, actually...

Zim got to his feet and started staring very intently at something moving around in the air. He settled into a crouch, wiggling his hips, and jumped forward with a loud "Hup!", slapping his hands together.

He fell flat on his face.

"It got away," GIR said.

Zim got up and brushed himself off, baring his teeth. He pounced again and fell again but this time he sat up with one fist thrust into the air. "I CAUGHT IT! I CAUGHT IT!" he yelled, shaking his fist. "LOOK! I CONQUERED THIS BUG WITH MY BARE HANDS! GIR! GIR, YOU AREN'T _LOOKING!"_

GIR was splashing in the lake.

"Recorded predatory behavior," Dib whispered into the video camera.

Zim popped the bug into his mouth, gagged on it and spit it out. Dib wondered why he kept trying to eat Earth food.

Dib realized a bug was not even food.

Zim turned his head, scouting for more bugs. He darted forward and clapped his hands together. "Dirt," he spat. Apparently it had gotten away. He spun on his heel, looking around for more bugs. He gasped and his antennae stood straight up and he pointed with a ramrod-straight arm. "GIR! GIR, THAT BUG IS ON FIRE! IT'S ON FIRE! I'm gonna-" He pounced at it. "I CAUGHT IT! It's not..." His antennae drooped and he frowned. "It's not really on fire. BUT I CAUGHT IT!" He pumped his fist in the air. "LOOK AT ME! GIR! I SAID LOOK AT ME!"

Dib considered the obvious practical ramifications of grabbing something that was on fire.

Zim ate the firefly, without apparent ill effect. "Edible," he muttered. "Excellent. Where did you go now, GIR?"

"Over here. I'm catching a fish," GIR said.

"What?" Zim recoiled dramatically. "GIR, what are you doing in there?"

"I just said! Sheesh!"

Zim scurried to the edge of the lake and then scurried aimlessly back and forth. He froze in one spot, cringing. He gingerly touched the water and jumped back. He looked at his hand. It wasn't steaming, he must be wearing a paste coating.

Zim watched GIR playing. He took a tiny step towards the shallowest part of the water.

A light breeze kicked up and a wave splashed at Zim. He turned around and ran a few feet away, yelping. "GIR! Get out of there!" he cried. "You don't know what's in there! GIR! Come back! Come back to me!"

GIR turned and stared at Zim.

Zim backed up a little.

GIR ran and took a flying leap and tackled Zim to the ground. "I caught one!" GIR screamed.

Zim flailed aimlessly. "Throw it back!"

"I caught a _bug! _From _space!"_

Zim went limp. "Oh, a bug."

"The bug is _you! _Duh!"

"I'm not from space." Zim sounded confused and a little annoyed. "I'm from Irk, GIR. Like you. And I have an endoskeleton."

"Irkens have endoskeletons," Dib whispered into the camera.

"Which you apparently want to destroy," Zim continued. "Get off me!" He threw GIR off onto the sand and stood up. "Now, I want you to help me collect these... light-up bugs. Do you know which ones, GIR?"

"No."

"They're the ones that light up." Zim pointed to a nearby firefly. "Like that. They light up."

GIR's head spun around a full 360 degrees.

Zim blinked. "Okay... just... help me collect these. I want to analyze them." He prowled around in aimless circles.

Dib shifted position. He had to pee.

Zim pounced at a firefly and grumbled to himself, having missed it.

GIR was sitting and playing in the sand.

Zim ran a little way down the beach and jumped. He fell and rolled in the sand. He popped back up and jumped again. He backed up a few steps and popped out his metal legs. Well, at least that was a good thing to have on tape.

Zim skittered up and down the beach, pouncing on bugs. He wasn't keeping the ones he caught, he was eating them all. Also he seemed to be scuffling around in the sand more than was necessary. He must be relying on GIR to catch the ones he was going to analyze later.

GIR was eating sand and coughing it back up.

Zim had apparently forgotten all about GIR. He was making incoherent yelping noises to himself and muttering things like "That one. Got one. One there."

Dib slipped an energy bar out of his pocket and started opening it. The wrapper made a loud tearing noise.

Zim stopped mumbling as if someone had flipped a switch.

Dib looked up. Zim had frozen in position, his antennae in the air and his head tipped back.

He cleared his throat loudly and dropped down to the ground, dusting his uniform off, tugging it into position, adjusting the position of his gloves... "GIR! We have to go."

GIR mumbled something around a mouthful of sand.

"There are things out here," Zim said. "It's really time we were getting back. I've indulged your foolishness for far too long."

GIR spat out the sand. "I saw you playing with the bugs!"

Zim leaned down, putting his hands on his knees and looking GIR straight in the eye. "No, GIR, you did not," he said.

"Oh," GIR said.

Zim took hold of GIR's wrist and tugged him to his feet. "Come on," he said. He led GIR across the sand. GIR obediently hopped into the cockpit.

Zim looked over his shoulder, glancing over the empty beach, which was now covered in spider-leg tracks and a few sand angels GIR had made. Zim cleared his throat, tugged at the collar of his shirt, and got into the spaceship.

When Dib was sure he was alone on the dark beach he carefully packed his things away. "Must be nice to be so bad at your job you have time to play with fireflies," he said to himself, standing up and shouldering his backpack.

He headed down the beach. He caught sight of a firefly in the corner of his eye.

He caught one with one hand on the very first try and he sure didn't fall over doing it either.

Ha.


	3. 31 infectious

A/N: I haven't written anything shippy in years and I'm running out of new takes on 'Zim + germs' so here's some light ZAGR. Warning: ZAGR.

* * *

"I've got the plague!"

Gaz lowered her controller and turned her head towards her open bedroom door. Zim sounded tinny and muffled.

She'd just won her game and had been about to go to bed. She couldn't do that with a screaming alien in the house. She set down the controller and padded out into the hallway.

She found Dib sitting on his bed in his underwear, holding a phone in his lap. His eyes were screwed shut. He held the phone to his mouth. "What are you talking about?" he said.

"BUBONIC PLAGUE!" Zim spat. "It must be from one of the rat gerbil things in the laboratory. I need antibiotics! Give them to me!"

"Take him off speaker phone," Gaz said.

Dib opened one eye. "He's not on speaker phone."

Gaz's eyebrows rose.

"Why do you think you have the plague?" Dib said into the phone.

"I have a lump on my neck!"

"Is it GIR?"

Zim was quiet for a few seconds. "NO!" he said finally.

"Is it huge, black and painful?"

"No! Ew!"

"Are you sick?"

"No! Me? No! Course not! I just have the plague!"

Dib rolled his eyes. "I really don't think you have the plague."

"Why? Why not?"

"Because... you just... aliens don't get plague. There have been studies."

"No there haven't."

"I just did them. It's real."

"What? How?"

Dib hung up the phone.

The ceiling fan clicked rythmically and ruffled Gaz's bangs. Crickets chirped outside the window. Gaz wondered why the great Professor Membrane hadn't fixed their air conditioning yet.

Dib yawned and brushed back his sweaty hair. He looked skinny and knobbly and nerdy in his smiley-face boxers. They were real smiley faces. As in, they were actually smiling. Some hated distant aunt must have bought him those. "He doesn't have bubonic plague because fleas carry it and his skin kills insects," he said. "That's what I should have said to begin with."

Okay. Whatever. "Did you give him our phone number?"

"He finds things," Dib muttered. "I'm sorry he woke you up."

Gaz shrugged.

Dib yawned. "Good night."

Gaz left his bedroom.

* * *

3:04 AM, glowed the alarm clock.

There was sweat all down Gaz's back. A light breeze came through the window and cooled her face.

She heard Dib speaking down the hall. "No! And you know how I know you don't have cholera? You get it from drinking water!"

Gaz kicked off the blankets and went back to sleep.

* * *

5:43 AM.

She heard footsteps going back and forth in the hall. "You do not have Ebola," Dib said. "You just don't have it! Okay? You just... don't... have... Ebola. Why are you doing this to me, Zim?"

Gaz shut her bedroom door and put her earplugs in.

The air was muggy like soup. Gaz's hair clung to her head. Her studded leather skirt stuck to her thighs and the insides of her knees. The skirt wasn't even tight.

The air above the pavement shivered. Dib sighed and brushed his hair off of his forehead. He pushed up his glasses, which were sliding down a nose slick with sweat.

Both of them looked up at the sound of clacking footsteps coming down the sidewalk. "Humans have to sleep, Zim!" he snapped. "Never call me in the middle of the night again or I'll, I'll-" He looked pleadingly at Gaz.

Gaz didn't like being woken up either. "I'll tear the freaky alien backpack wires out of your chest and tie them to Dib!"

"Uh, okay," Zim muttered, standing in his usual spot near Dib's knee, like a dumb dog. He was looking down at the ground.

Dib rubbed his eyes.

The bus pulled up and they got in. Dib took his usual window seat. Gaz sat down in the aisle seat. Zim wriggled in to sit between them.

"What are you doing?" Gaz said. There wasn't enough room to sit next together without their sides touching.

Dib sighed. He pushed on Zim's shoulder. "Scat!"

"Fine. It reeks in here anyway." Zim got up and got off the bus.

"He is so weird," Gaz said.

Dib nodded. "No kidding! It's almost like he's, I don't know. From outer space and trying to kill us all." He glared at the back of the head of the kid who was sitting in front of them. Said kid got up and moved to a seat on the other side of the aisle.

"This is why we walk to skool," Dib muttered.

Gaz took out her dog-eared copy of Punch Club. "Are you still looking for Bigfoot tomorrow?"

Dib sat up straight and wiggled a little. "I'm not looking for him, Gaz. I found him a while ago, remember? I'll be cataloging his hideout, and-"

"Tomorrow, though, right?"

"Yeah. I'm going to look through his scat for-"

Gaz tuned him out.

* * *

Gaz glanced up from her mushy-carrots-in-mustard to see Zim sitting across from her. Something seemed different about him.

"Where's your tray to poke at?" Dib asked. Ah yeah, that was it, Zim didn't have a tray. That wasn't very interesting. Gaz looked back at her own tray.

Wait, had he also been looking at her? She glanced up. If he had been, he was looking at Dib now. Good.

She went back to eating her food.

"Don't want one," Zim said.

"You never want one."

Zim tilted his head, narrowing one eye and looking more deranged than usual. "You don't understand what your planet is capable of, do you?"

Dib sighed a little. "Like what?"

"Invisible creatures that cannot be stopped. That will melt a human being from the inside out into a squirming pile of oozing, contaminated flesh gunk!"

Gaz would admit that that actually sounded pretty neat.

"You're still on the germs kick, huh?" Dib rubbed the bridge of his nose. "What's going on? Really? Why do you think you're sick?"

Zim drummed his fingers on the table. It was annoying. Gaz looked up from her tray.

"My throat's sore," Zim said, dropping his eyes to the ground and pouting. Whiner. That didn't sound like 'oozing, contaminated flesh gunk' to Gaz.

Dib closed his eyes and said nothing for a long time. Zim started to tremble. "What? Why can't you speak of it? What's wrong with me? YOU DID SOMETHING, DIDN'T Y-" He broke off, rubbing his throat and whimpering.

Dib took in a deep breath and let it out through his nose. "Have you noticed how loud you are, Zim?" he asked.

Zim tapped his lower lip, rolling his eyes to the ceiling in thought. "I am rather impressive in that way."

"Have you ever thought that maybe you screamed yourself sore?"

"That's never happened before!"

"Well, however it happened, a sore throat is never a big deal." Dib dropped his attention to his tray of gross food.

Zim scoffed. "Your ignorance repels Zim!"

"Does my ignorance repel Zim to a different table where I won't have to deal with Zim's bull crap?"

"I. Could. Have. Cancer!"

"But you don't!" Now Dib was the loud one. Zim flinched an an exaggerated manner. "You were playing around on Web MD, weren't you?"

"I was not PLAYI-" Zim's voice choked off and he grabbed at his neck.

"There!" Dib tossed his hands into the air. "You're doing it to yourself right now!"

Zim sounded hoarse. "Why should I believe you over the human medical authorities?"

"Because when you say 'human medical authorities' you really mean 'you and the Internet'!" Dib started smashing peas with his fork. "Maybe you have a cold. MAYBE. Okay?"

"O- or the avian flu!"

"Or loud-horrible-alien-disease!"

Zim's eyes narrowed. "I know you want me dead, but this is insulting."

Gaz had been finding the argument slightly amusing but now she was tired of it. She flicked a wad of food at Zim's head. It landed with a satisfying hiss and he ran away, screaming.

"See? He's doing it to himself," Dib said.

Gaz ate her lunch.

* * *

Gaz opened the cupboard door and took stock. Bacon-flavored Pringles, Double-Stuf Oreos, a few cans of room-temperature cream soda and... a dirty shoe.

It'd do, she guessed. She loaded everything but the shoe into her backpack.

Something heavy hit the floor in the living room. "I'm headin' out, Gaz!" Dib called. "If anything inhuman tries to get in the house, my stun gun is underneath my bed! If it's Mysterious Mysteries, my latest reports are right next to the stun gun. If it's Zim, just kick him."

She grunted.

"I'll be back sometime tomorrow," he said. "If I don't come back, activate Dad's tracking program!"

She grunted.

The front door opened and shut.

Gaz shut the cabinet and hauled her food into the living room for later.

* * *

10:23 PM. Gaz sat facing her window.

Mmrh. She looked eager. Not eager in the normal sense, as nothing showed on her face, but looking in the direction she expected him to come from would be eager by Gaz standards. She turned away.

Now she looked like she cared about not looking eager. She looked back at the window. Wait. Now she looked eager again.

She crossed the floor to her desk and picked up her pencil. Her sketchbook still needed work, she thought, not that she would admit it to anyone. She was the best in her art class. She wanted to be the best online, too. From there she'd become the best in whatever was next.

The newest picture was of a slavering insectoid monster with limbs growing from the wrong places and teeth and claws that looked ready to cut through the paper. She had titled it 'Miz'. Zim in another universe- one where he was good at being an alien.

She worked on Miz's shading for a few strokes, deepening the shadows and blending midtone with highlight. Charcoal got on her hands and she made a light area too dark when she underestimated how much pigment had transferred to her finger. She growled.

Muggy air floated in through her open window.

It was 10:05. Zim was always punctual to the minute unless something had happened to him. He had told her once there was a clock in his head. She believed it. She didn't always believe him when he told her things about his species; she was pretty sure he made things up to sound cool. He never sounded cool.

She heard a scratching noise from the window. She did not look up. It occurred to her that if she did look happy to see him he might not even notice or care. But that was what made him almost-tolerable, wasn't it?

Yeah, almost.

She made him clear his throat and then she made him say "Hello?" Then she made him say it again, louder. He sounded painfully hoarse. She was of the opinion that Dib was wrong and that Zim really was getting a cold. Not that it really mattered.

She turned. "Yeah."

He sat on the windowsill with his ankles crossed and his Pak keeping him anchored to the window frame. Gaz had ignored the Pak at first, until she understood what it was. Now she wanted one. She knew Zim wouldn't give her one- it would be against his shouty alien code. She would figure out how to build her own eventually.

Zim had an armful of flat plastic objects. She took them. They were warm from his body heat.

She looked at the titles. All in Irken, except for one that was in English and just said 'DOOM CANNON X!' in black letters in Chiller font on a purple background. It looked like it had been printed out on an inkjet printer. The title wasn't even centered.

One of the cases was missing an insert. A lot of them looked like GIR had chewed them. Typical. She wondered if he got these off of space eBay.

She headed for her bedroom door. Zim trailed after her.

She turned on the TV and popped the first game into the SlayStation. It didn't work. A lot of these Irken games were incompatible with her systems. She tossed this one aside. "Strike one."

Zim grunted. He climbed up onto the couch and flopped down. His usual jerky, spasmodic movements had become sort of slow and limp.

She put in the next one. It worked okay. The graphics were okay. She set it aside and popped in another one. This one wouldn't play, either because it was incompatible or because the disk was too scratched.

"Strike two." If she made it to strike three, she would kick him out of the house. If the rest of the games passed inspection, he'd be allowed to poke around Dib's room destroying evidence or drawing mustaches on things or whatever.

The next game looked boring, but it worked. She let it pass.

The next one was all in Irken. She could have struck him out with that, but she'd taught herself to read Irken (it wasn't that hard, it was just a letter substitution system- aliens were boring) and this one had phenomenal animation.

One game left. She put it in.

Sucky graphics. And there was an opening text dump. Not looking good so far.

YOU ARE A FEROCIOUS HIDEOUS BEAST, said the opening crawl, OF MADNESS AND FURY. YOU KNOW ONLY DEATH AND DESTRCTION.

Typos.

DESPITE ONLY BEING A PATHETIC HUMAN YOU ARE INVESTED WITH POWERS THAT BAFFLE THE MOST SUPERIR MIND OF OUR TIME.

Gaz raised an eyebrow.

CLEARLY YOU HAVE BEEN ALTERED IN SOMEWAY, SOME HORRIBLE, UNNATURAL MANNER, AND REQUIRE EXTENSIVE TESTING AT A LTER DATE BUT NO MATTER. YOU, GAZ

What.

ARE THE LAST HOPE OF THE THING. THAT YOU WILL SAVE. THAT ISNT HUMANS, BECAUSE THERE IS NO SAVING YOUR SPECIES NOW. IN FACT, THIS IS IN THE FUTURE AND ZIM HAS KILLED EVERY LAST ONE OF YOUR KIND BUT YOU AND… UHHH… DIB, WHO HAS BECOME A MUTANT RAT CREATURE AND REFUSES TO PERISH AND YOU MUST KILL HIM DESTROY HIM GAZ GO NOW

The level started. And there was a sprite of Gaz clearly adapted from a photograph.

She turned around. "What. Is this," she said.

Zim was slumped on the couch. "Game."

"What. Is. This!"

"'S game."

"I know it's a game," she said. "Why am I in the game?"

"Enh?" He squinted at the screen. He looked flushed and a little… sticky. "Oh. Oh, yes! Impressive, enh?" He sounded completely stuffed up now. He didn't have a nose. Dib would probably harp on that later.

"Why did you make a game with me in it?" And why hadn't he used spell check on it?

He frowned at her. "Feel honored!" He coughed without covering his mouth.

She looked back at the screen. She tapped a few buttons and discovered that the video game version of herself could shoot black fireballs out of her fists and spit acid.

"The games pass, you can stay," she said.

"Well, of course," Zim said. He closed his eyes and rested his head on the arm of the couch, wheezing through a layer of phlegm. Gross.

* * *

8:23 AM.

Gaz crunched the last Oreo. A victory Oreo. She'd just beat Zim's stupid game. He'd obviously worked his butt off on it. It had still kind of sucked. Dumb alien.

She turned off the game system and stood up, stretching. She jumped a little. Zim was still on the couch, burrowed in face down.

"Hey," she said.

He picked his head up. He looked a little drunk.

"You were supposed to go mess with Dib's stuff," Gaz said.

Zim moaned and flopped back down.

Gaz watched him for a minute. "Go home," she said. "Dib will be here soon."

"Nnh." He got to his feet, wobbling slightly, and limped out of the room.

She picked up the games and put them away.

* * *

Gaz sort of… wriggled out of sleep. It was 12:12 AM. Usually she would have still been up playing video games at this time of night.

"No," Dib sighed from down the hall. "You don't have any tonsils, Zim. No, Zim… you don't have an appendix. Don't you have alien doctors you can talk to?"

Gaz flipped over in bed, kicking off the covers.

"Just- look, I don't think you even know what that is," Dib continued. "I'm hanging up now, okay? Bye!"

"I'm gonna kill him," Gaz muttered. Her head hurt.

* * *

"Where is he?"

Dib glared down the sidewalk.

Gaz punched buttons on her Gameslave. She could see heat shimmers above the pavement, but she felt cold. Her teeth ground together.

Dib reached into his pocket and pulled out a little disk, one of his talismans, probably, and he fiddled with it, scowling. "He's probably up to something."

"He's sick."

"Sure."

"He's sick, Dib. You think you understand everything but you don't. You just don't get it!" She'd gotten a game over. Both her eyes popped open. She'd only been on Level 5.

Dib just raised an eyebrow at her and looked away.

Dib was the one who hung around the stupid alien and chased him all the time. He was the one who should've caught the cold. She sniffed.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

Gaz was NOT a whiner. "Yes." She started the game over.

She glanced down the sidewalk. Nothing. He was probably lying around his base being a slug.

Her knuckles turned white as she gripped the Gameslave. If she'd known he was going to infect her she would have never let him into the house.

* * *

A/N: This was more of a jumbly experimental stream of consciousness... pretentious-word-for-mess than I usually write. I'm trying to get over my incredible awkwardness with writing any kind of pairing. Maybe it would be easier if I wrote for fandoms where characters actually like each othNO THAT WOULD BE CHEATING.

Anyway, so far all of these bits of writing have been about characters observing Zim which is weird but if you read these you're weird too so it's okay.


	4. 37 haunted

A/N: This was going to be about Zim observing Dib for a change, but it turns out Zim's bad at that and was spotted almost immediately.

* * *

Zim popped open the trunk about half an inch with a twist of his wrist. He peered out through the narrow opening. His own breathing was quite loud and harsh in the small space. He bit his lip and tried to quiet himself. How good was Dib's hearing anyway?

Where were they? Zim just saw trees from here. If Dib had carted him out to the middle of nowhere to look at fairies or something Zim was going to be very annoyed.

He heard the door open. He withdrew into the trunk, slamming it shut.

He heard Dib walk around the perimeter of the car. The air in the trunk was very hot and close and stuffy and wasn't of very good quality. Zim was gasping and sweaty.

Another of the car doors opened. Zim heard Dib move something around. He was humming. He couldn't carry a tune.

"Okay!" Zim heard something beeping. "Video camera on. This is Agent Mothman of the Swollen Eyeball network. I'm outside of a documented haunted house! I'm going to go in it and... document it some more! With video evidence this time!"

Dib had gone out to document things? But that was what he did all the time! Didn't he ever do anything else?

Dib's footsteps headed away from the car. Zim pushed the trunk back open and pulled in a deep breath of semi-fresh air. It was still Earth air, which smelled terrible and burned his throat.

He wondered what he'd been expecting Dib to have planned for the evening. Certainly not a social event. The other humans had some inexplicable distaste of Dib. Not that Dib wasn't inherently distasteful, but Zim didn't understand why other humans would understand that, as they were also awful. Besides, Dib didn't follow them home, slip insulting notes under their doors, mock them at every opportunity-

Okay, the mission was to watch Dib, not take revenge. Zim would think about other things before he got too angry to think at all. How about getting out of the car?

He started climbing out of the trunk only to have it fall shut on the softest part of his belly and very nearly chop him in half. He had to pry himself out with all four of his Pak legs, using them against each other as levers.

At least he was out of the trunk now. He'd been in the trunk of Dib's car many times, and usually not by choice.

The car was parked facing a large house that appeared to be in an advanced state of disrepair. Zim adjusted his disguise, checking it in the rearview mirror. He looked decent. 'Decent' was about as far as he was willing to go in regards to any human disguise. He far preferred his real face. He still looked better than any actual human, though.

He was wearing a sweatshirt and jeans for an extra layer of disguise. Dib had been pretending to ignore him lately, which meant he must be up to something horrible and dangerous.

Zim did not like wearing human clothes. The sweatshirt was okay, it was soft, at least. The jeans were stiff and had chafy seams and were a little tighter around the waist than Zim particularly liked.

Zim realized he had just wasted about five minutes trying to get the jeans to sit comfortably on his hips. This was stupid, he was an Invader.

He took the video recording device out of his pocket, checked it, returned it to his pocket and marched up to the front door of the house.

There was a little sign on the doorknob: Please do not enter. Paranormal investigation in progress.

Zim took off the sign and tucked it into his Pak. Dib would never see it again. Small victories.

He reached for the doorknob.

Ah, wait. Dib could be right on the other side. He pulled away, shifting his weight onto first one foot and then the other.

He peeked through one of the windows and saw no one. Dib must be further inside the house.

Zim turned the doorknob, slowly, as to make no noise. He slipped inside, glanced around to verify the lack of Dib in the room, and crawled up the wall to cling to the ceiling. His left front Pak leg went straight through the rotting plaster. He yelped, slipping and scrabbling against the ceiling with his hands for purchase.

"Do you hear that?" Dib hissed from an adjacent room, most likely speaking to no one at all. "That sounds like legitimate poultergeist activity! I'm gonna check it out!"

Zim tugged his leg out of the plaster and hurried across the ceiling. He wasn't familiar with the place and he was a little disoriented from hanging upside down and he wound up colliding face-first with some kind of hanging... glass... thing. Some human thing. He backed up and rubbed at his sore face.

A door creaked open. Zim flattened himself to the ceiling. He couldn't do much about the joints of his secondary legs sticking up. Or, er, down. Away from the surface of the ceiling, anyway. He also couldn't really do anything about having green skin that stood out against the gray plaster like grass sprouting through a crack in the pavement.

He heard nothing for a minute, apart from his hammering pulse.

"Hello," Dib said, not sounding in the least surprised. "Fancy seeing you here."

Zim said the first thing that came to mind. "I'm a ghost."

"Yeah, I wish."

Zim backed up and turned around, looking down at Dib.

"You thought you could escape me, didn't you? Well, you can't," Zim said. All the blood had run into his head. He was having difficulty coming up with good banter.

Dib's video camera was pointing at the floor. A disguise this good wasn't even worth trying to disprove, apparently. Because surely, he should have been filming Zim because Zim was what the humans called "an enormous deal". Humans and their weird obsession with discount pricing.

Dib folded his arms over his chest and raised an eyebrow. "Feeling a little neglected, are we?"

Zim sputtered. "What are you talking about?"

Tiring of being upside down, he jumped down to the floor and landed with what he considered to be the agility of a cat. He waved his arms a little to keep his balance.

"You know what I'm talking about," Dib said, "I haven't been around your house in months. I've had other paranormal activity to investigate, but I'm sure you think it's about you. Because everything's about you."

"Oh yeah? You think I'm here because of you," Zim countered. "Don't you, Dib? Don't you!"

Dib sighed slightly. "Well, yes. Because you are."

Zim was suddenly distracted by his uncomfortable jeans, which had shifted so that one of the buttons jabbed into his flesh, and had to spend a few minutes adjusting them while Dib found other things to look at. "I made the mistake of thinking you were doing something useful with your time," he said finally. Which was true. If Zim had realized Dib was going to just be screwing around on other people's property he wouldn't have bothered to come. He'd honestly thought Dib had the sense to spend his free time scheming against his most dangerous enemy... Zim's mistake. "But you're... not. So I'll go." He went for the front door.

It was gone.

Zim scurried backwards. "The door's gone," he said aloud. The room felt cold, suddenly, and rather damp.

"Wow!" Dib took a picture of the door-less wall.

"Don't just stand there and take pictures of it! We have to get out of here!" Zim's heart was in his throat. The walls were closing in.

"Wow!" Dib said again, and hefted his video camera. "Behold! Moving walls! There's no scientific explanation for that!"

Oh, so the walls were actually closing in. Zim had thought for a moment that he was just... never mind. "We're going to die!"

The space was very small already. Zim backed up until he collided with Dib's legs and sat down on the floor.

"Behold! Existential fear with no logical cause!" Dib pointed the video camera down at Zim, who stared at the lens, trying to wrap his mind around this idiocy. No logical cause? The walls were about to crush them. "Take this one with a grain of salt, though. The subject in frame is a moron. Oh, and a space alien."

Looking up at Dib, Zim noticed something on the ceiling, up past the human's large annoying head. The hole where his leg had gone through earlier.

Zim hurried up the wall. He pounded on the ceiling with his fist and a large piece of it crumbled off and hit Dib in the face. Zim crawled through the resulting space into damp, wood-smelling darkness.

He looked down back into the room he'd just escaped and saw Dib standing there, looking around at the encroaching walls, which moved without sound or any visible means of propulsion.

Dib crushed between four walls skin bursting bones breaking blood everywhere horrible coppery acidic human blood-

Zim shook himself out of the daydream, if one could call it that- sometimes they were more like some kind of mental attack. Dib was looking up at him with his eyes wide in realization. Oh, right, moving walls could crush you! Now who was the idiot?

Zim almost said that aloud but didn't.

He hooked the collar of Dib's shirt with the tip of a Pak leg and hauled him up through the hole. Dib squawked and pulled away, very nearly falling right back into the room, which would have served him right.

Zim watched as the walls slammed together on that glass thing he'd hit with his face. It shattered. Zim recoiled.

"Real ghost activity!" Dib said. "And I have it on tape!"

Zim was trapped in a small space with his worst enemy, and no way to escape, and it smelled bad in here. And his jeans were too tight. He should have stayed home and watched Plastic Surgeries Gone Wrong the way GIR had wanted him to. Or at least he should have let Dib be crushed to death.

"Behold!" Zim was looking into a bright light- Dib's video camera. "My annoying tag-along is having a nervous breakdown. Zim, what are you experiencing right now?"

"I..." Zim rubbed at his eyes with the back of his hand. His skin felt warm. This sweatshirt was a bit too heavy. The video camera light was blinding. "What?" Nervous breakdown? Hardly. He was breathing a little hard from the exertion, was all. Dib was heavy.

"Is anything trying to invade your psyche and control you?" Dib asked.

Zim didn't... think so... he wasn't entirely sure what that meant, actually. "I have to get out of here!" This much Dib babble was going to turn him insane.

"Hm, okay," Dib said to the camera. "He wants to escape, which is pretty typical for the subject in question, actually."

Zim tapped on the walls and ceiling and found a spongey spot above them. He scratched at it with both hands. It turned to powder and got in his eyes.

"Man! The first ever video of an alien in a haunted house. This is awesome!" Dib was burbling.

Ungrateful wretch. "You could be helping!" Zim snapped. "This is your fault!"

"I sure did make you follow me here. Not." Dib turned his video camera around to get a good view of the cramped, stinking space they were in. "Okay, so, to recap, in case you missed anything, I entered a haunted house to investigate." Zim opened his mouth to respond (he hadn't missed anything and he didn't appreciate the recap) but then realized Dib was narrating for the camera. "This alien I've been chasing for a while followed me in. This is him." Zim was now staring into the video camera light again. "His name's Zim. He's an Irken Invader bent on destroying mankind and he lives at 355 Oak Street, Crapville, Michigan, United States, you can come collect him for dissection at any time, you know!"

Zim hissed at the camera and reached out to confiscate it. Dib had the audacity to slap his hand away. "Okay," Dib continued, "so when Zim showed up, the room we were in compressed into a dot and we escaped through the ceiling into some kind of crawl space and now we're stuck."

Zim imagined living here for weeks while he was being slowly poisoned to death by noxious human waste fluids generated by Dib, and he shuddered.

"Was that a chill?" Dib asked. "Did a ghost go through you?"

"What? No." He scratched at the ceiling some more.

"Hm," Dib said. "There doesn't seem to be much to record in this crawlspace." He reached up and easily knocked a hole in the ceiling with one fleshy fist. A hunk of plaster hit Zim on the head and some dust got into his mouth. While he sputtered, Dib crawled up through the ceiling.

The increasing physical strength of the human was cause for concern, but could be dealt with later. Knowing Dib, he wouldn't even realize that he could probably, um, strangle Zim with his bare hands. To death.

Zim swallowed and followed Dib through the hole.

They were in a large bedroom, with a wooden floor and a big double bed. There was a window taking up most of one wall. Everything was dusty. There were things scattered across the floor... wooden figures, dolls, some thing on wheels, assorted strange human playthings, or at least Zim was assuming they were all toys...

Zim's chest tightened. His heart fluttered and he struggled to take a breath. He felt as if something was... squeezing him. From the inside.

Dib aimed the camera at the floor, the walls, the ceiling... he hadn't noticed that Zim was struggling to breathe, probably having a bad reaction to all this dust. What was even worth filming in here?

Oh.

The dust was gone. A woman sat in a rocking chair in the corner of the room. Her eyes were vacant. White bandages covered her head. Some kind of flowy black thing enveloped her body.

It was daylight outside the window, and not midnight anymore. Zim walked over to the window, looked out and saw some kind of contraption with a horse tied to it where Dib's car should be parked.

"Hey!"

There was a pressure on his throat... Dib's knuckles against the back of his neck... it was dark again, a cool breeze chilled his face...

Zim had opened the window and swung one leg over the sill. Dib had a fistful of his sweatshirt collar.

"You were possessed just now, weren't you?" Dib was, of course, filming all this.

"I..."

"You were going to jump!" Dib sounded ecstatic.

Zim scrambled back inside and slammed the window shut. As he did so, he realized the window was a potential means of escape.

The window refused to re-open.

Of course.

"What did you feel?" Dib was asking.

"Nothing," Zim replied.

"Come on. Please! I've never been possessed! What's it like?"

"I felt nothing." The nothing had been so total and encompassing that Zim almost welcomed back the flutterings of fear in his belly.

"Fine, don't tell me." Dib filmed the ceiling for no apparent reason.

Zim tapped at the edges of the window. He looked at his pale reflection in the glass and felt like he was looking at someone else. As if that wasn't him, even though he knew it was his own face.

Never mind that now. He looked over his shoulder. That thing in the rocking chair was gone.

Dib followed his gaze. "What?"

"Eh, there's nothing there." Not anymore.

Zim pounded on the window. It wouldn't break. His Pak also proved useless against the window. All right... if it had shattered into his face it might have put his eye out anyway, what a hassle that would have been...

Zim looked over the room and found a door leading out. He tried the knob and it opened. Not only did it open, but it seemed to turn by itself when his fingers touched the metal. He realized he was breathing harshly through his mouth, and his throat was getting sore because of it. He swallowed and closed his eyes for a moment.

The door led to a hallway, long and dusty and dark. Zim tipped his head back and sniffed at the air with his mouth slightly open. There was something very wrong with the smell here. He gagged. The roof of his mouth burned.

Something cold slid over Zim's cheek and down to his chin. It felt like a hand. A frigid hand.

Zim was sweating. "Who's there?"

No one was there.

Dib made a strangled noise of excitement. "What do you mean, 'who's there'?"

Zim reached up to try to turn away the invisible hand. It had already left, however. "Nothing. I said nothing!" He just wanted to go home and put on comfortable clothing and turn on the TV and have a snack. That was all.

A young woman stood there, her eyes empty bloody sockets. She had no hair, and a scar across her forehead.

Then she was gone.

There had been scratch marks on her cheeks. She'd clawed out her own eyes...

Zim backed up. He heard a woman screaming over and over again. Now she was at the end of the hallway, doubled over on the ground, screaming. She vanished, but Zim still heard screaming.

Oh, Zim was screaming.

Dib was filming him screaming.

"STOP THAT!" Zim was shaking all over. "Look what you've DONE!"

Dib didn't have the decency to be ashamed, he never did. "Hey, you followed me here. This is a normal mission for me, you know."

Normal? Dib did this routinely?

Zim swallowed past a lump in his throat. "How many of these creatures are there?"

"In here?" Dib filmed the ceiling, walls, floor... "I don't know! I'm going to find out!"

Zim had meant to inquire about how many of these things inhabited Earth. Too many, probably. Well, one was too many, really.

But no one had said Invading would be easy, right? Eh? Besides, Dib wasn't afraid at all...

Zim headed down the hallway, head lowered and hands jammed in pockets, Dib faithfully trailing after with the camera.

His jeans were riding up again. If Zim had known he would end up in here with a ghost thing he would have worn his normal uniform.

His boots were splashing in something. He looked down. There was a thin layer of scentless blood on the floor. Sure, of course.

He heard faint whispering.

There was a door opening off of the hallway into a dark room. Zim looked through it.

That woman lay on the floor sprawled on her back, one arm flung carelessly out to the side. The other arm was bent, the hand at her throat, fingers hooked into torn and bloody flesh. Her eyes were covered with a cloth. The lobotomy scar was now mostly hidden by wispy bangs.

Tearing out her eyes and throat like that must have taken incredible strength. Humans didn't have claws.

(((do you see me)))

Zim's mouth was dry. The words had just appeared in his head out of nowhere. "See what?" he replied, though certainly there was nothing to reply to-

(((you are LYING)))

Pain flared in Zim's head and the next he knew he was kneeling on the ground in the blood that wasn't really there and he was touching his throat, his claws partially detracted- just enough for him to feel their tips on his skin. He hadn't worn gloves.

He could feel his own pulse. "No," he said in a husky, stifled voice, shaking his head slightly. "Very funny. Why would you want to-"

((i can see what you are))

((KILLER))

His claws pricked his flesh ever so slightly. A choked cry came from somewhere in his chest.

A meaty human hand fastened on his wrist, pulling away the traitorous claws. The hand was so hot, and so large with its five long fingers that it made Zim's wrist look like a toothpick. It wasn't natural. It was wrong. After all this time on Earth, it was a shock sometimes to look at a human hand and remember how wrong it was.

(RELEASE HIM)

"You hear it again, don't you?"

(YOU HAVE NOT DONE YOUR JOB, BOY)

"Show yourself!" Dib aimed the camera everywhere but at the corpse on the floor. This iteration of the woman didn't seem inclined to vanish like the others. Instead it was rotting as Zim watched it.

She screamed again. Dib was holding Zim's arms pinned to his side by wrapping one arm around Zim's upper body, keeping his claws from going right back to his own very important blood vessels.

(RELEASE HIM)

Dib couldn't hear that at all, could he?

"Dib, you don't hear a, uh, a woman, do you?" Zim inquired, his tone light. Dib let go of him.

"No, and that means the camera's not getting it either!" Dib was obviously annoyed.

(YOUR FATHER HAS RUINED YOU, BOY)

"Stop that," Zim told the corpse, "he can't hear you. Nor can he see you." Zim wished he couldn't see her either.

"What's she saying? Who's there?"

Zim turned and looked over his shoulder. "I thought you were some kinda expert!"

"Don't screw around! Come on! Why can't I see her?"

(CREATURE OF DEATH AND MADNESS I WILL HAVE YOU)

Zim's throat and chest convulsed and he heard himself speaking but without anything of tone or inflection that was his own. "Release him to me! I want him!"

"Wuh... wow! Observe the ghost has taken an intense, immediate dislike to the alien. Both of them are completely real!" Dib said for the camera.

"Give him to me," the ghost said, using Zim's body. He pawed at his throat. "I want his pain and hatred. Help. DIB!" Zim reached out and grabbed Dib's pant leg, managing to move of his own volition. Dib recoiled and sort of kicked him away a little.

"Okay, the ghost wants to kill the alien," said Dib. "I think they're going to have a fight!"

Zim couldn't fight the ghost if the ghost was controlling him from the inside! He balked at telling Dib that, though. "Get me out of this place!" he cried instead.

"I don't know how to get out," was Dib's reply.

"What?"

Dib shrugged.

What kind of stupid, bad expert was he? Fine. Zim was used to having to do everything himself, after all!

Zim wrapped his arms around his chest, hoping that in some way it would keep the ghost from getting back in. Somehow. "Get out," he said. "Leave me, echo of human! YOU WILL NOT HAVE ME!"

Dib was still filming.

(i want you)

"Too bad!"

(i always get what i want)

"I said no!"

(i feel your fear i want your fear)

Zim bit his lip and tried to swallow the wavery feelings that made his pulse hammer and his hands tremble. He'd hardly noticed that he was afraid. He was trained to ignore those feelings, after all.

He folded his arms over his chest. "You're a human. A dead human. I'm not afraid of you!"

(but you are)

"Nope!"

(SELF-DECEIVER YOU CANNOT EVEN TEAR YOUR OWN FLESH)

Zim scratched the back of his hand a little, leaving a small white line.

(YOU WILL NOT BLEED)

"I could if I wanted to," he said. "I just don't want to, okay? OKAY?" He gestured at the spectral corpse on the floor, which was now rotted to skeleton. "Why would I do that? And trap myself in this rotting wooden house when the Irkens are masters of the stars? Please." He shoved his hands into his pockets.

Dib was kneeling on the floor to film Zim dead-on instead of at an angle. Zim found this unnecessary and condescending.

He thrust his chest out and threw back his shoulders. "Why don't you fight me instead of hiding and saying silly, insulting things into my head? You are the one who fears Zim!"

(self-deceiver)

"You said that already."

(creature of deceit and hate)

Zim recoiled, feeling something hit him in the face. He brushed something off his cheek and looked at it. It was... ghost spit. The ghost had spat on him.

That was just... wrong. His throat locked up and he quietly wiped his face on his sleeve and his hand on his jeans.

The ghost didn't seem to be feeling talkative anymore. Zim tried another door a little further down the hallway. It opened onto a small closet that contained only a hamper full of writhing black beetles. "Okay," Zim muttered to himself. He'd been hoping for a staircase or balcony, something that would lead to an exit.

"Ask the ghost why I can't hear her directly," Dib said.

Instead, Zim said... "I notice you've had some kind of... corrective head surgery." Zim found he was gesturing vaguely at his forehead as if he expected his words not to carry his meaning for him- a silly thought. He was very articulate, he knew that. "Why did that... happen?"

Dib lowered the video camera, sneering, and Zim realized he'd thought the head remark was directed at him. "That's one of the worst ones yet," he said.

"Not you, the ghost! Be quiet!"

"Ooh," Dib said, hefting the camera. Zim tried to ignore him.

He waited, and waited, and had decided she wouldn't answer when

(((they operated to make me better)))

"You were sick in the brains?"

Another long pause.

(((yes...)))

"How so?"

She once again made Zim wait several minutes for her answer. He put his hands on his hips and tapped his foot.

(((i was like you)))

Zim felt his body tense and heard his own rather melodramatic gasp before he could think.

(((i am no longer like you)))

He should scoff at this. She was human. He wasn't. They weren't alike and never could have been alike.

But...

(((stay with me)))

(((i will be nice)))

(((i won't hurt you)))

"You spat on me," Zim said.

(((it is hard for us to be nice)))

(((you know this)))

((KILLER))

Zim cleared his throat and re-adjusted his stupid rough stiff awful human pants. "If you want to show me... er... niceness, then perhaps you could just... let me leave."

(((then you'd be gone)))

"Uh... no. I'd come back. With, uh... with more comfortable pants. You see-"

"Uh, yeah, I've seen more than I wanted to," Dib interjected. "Could you maybe stop doing that? You're on camera, you know. Why is it that whenever I turn on my video camera you start throwing up or taking your clothes off?"

Zim's eyes narrowed.

(((you will NOT return)))

She was right, of course. If... er... when he left this place, he'd never come back inside. In fact, he was toying with the idea of burning the-

(YOU WILL NOT BURN MY HOUSE)

Oh... okay... okay then, he wouldn't...

Zim felt a hand slap his cheek. Hard.

He rubbed the tingling spot where the blow had landed. He wasn't fond of being slapped, or spat on, but he supposed it was better than being forced to commit suicide. Still.

"STOP THAT!" he screamed. He had intended an imperious command but he sounded hoarse, shrill and unpleasant.

((say you'll stay))

"I will NOT stay here!" He stomped his foot to add emphasis. "You're horrible! You're so horrib-"

He couldn't breathe.

Zim fell to his knees. His vision clouded over.

"Hey," Dib said, tugging at his shoulder.

Zim couldn't answer. His throat was all bunched up and no air could get through.

"Zim?"

((got you))

Before then the mental words had changed in force and volume but had had no other tone, and no evidence of emotion. Now they were unmistakably satisfied.

Something fell into Zim's hands. He stared down at it. Air rushed down his throat. It tasted foul, the whole place did, but it was a definite improvement over not breathing.

The thing in his hands was a carved wooden disk. It looked stupid. It looked all sloppy, it looked like a little kid had made it.

His hands tightened on it. He was still sucking in air as if he was in danger of running out of it- well, he could be in danger of running out, he didn't know. He looked up and the house they were in was now much smaller, and somehow paler, and there were crumbled away bits of the walls and ceiling.

"Wow," Dib breathed. "I think it was feeding off of your life energy to effect the haunting. That's a protective talisman. I was wearing one the whole time, that must be why the ghost didn't go for me!"

Zim nodded, although he had no idea what any of that meant. His skin felt cold all over. He pressed the talisman to his chest. If it really had dispelled the ghost, he wanted to keep it forever.

Dib inched forward, testing the floor with his feet before he stood on it. When one board creaked ominously he drew back. "Wow," he said again. "Take that back off and see what happens," he suggested.

"No," Zim muttered, clutching the talisman even tighter. A stray splinter stuck into his hand. He flinched but didn't relax his grip.

It certainly did look hand-made. Had Dib made this? It had the face from Dib's shirt painted on it.

Human surgery was barbaric. That woman's brain must have been completely mutilated. Zim could not imagine ever wanting to tear open his own flesh that way... but of course, he wasn't human.

Dib had the option to take off his own protective talisman, and he wasn't taking it off. The reeking human looked at his watch. "Gosh darnit. I have school in an hour," he sighed.

Zim had done enough research to cover the day, he believed. He'd skip school.

He got to his feet. "Take me home, Dib," he ordered, and it sounded like an order, all firm and not shaky- good.

"Why would I do th-"

"Home!"

"Come o-"

"HOME, DIB, NOW!" His hands shook.

Dib snorted and rolled his eyes. "Oh, all right. If I leave you here you'll probably just wreck the place."

Zim followed Dib out of the house, carefully picking his way along the floor. All sizes of rotten places had suddenly appeared in the woodwork and Zim's knees were shaking and making it difficult to navigate.

Dib narrated to the camera as they went. "Unfortunately I have to cut my investigation short due to... extenuating circumstances. It's Zim's fault. He was going to get himself killed and I've spent too many hours carefully observing and cultivating a system of communication with this live alien specimen to let him be absorbed into the ether." No, Dib was an incompetent human smeet and had to go to skool. "Not to mention he knows too many things that I'm carefully guarding from the spirit world."

Zim had a pounding headache and didn't care about any of this.

Dib stopped and turned to film the inside of the house some more. "Note that the house fell into instant disrepair when it was cut off from Zim's energy. You've just witnessed an alien powered ghost phenomenon involving the famed Lady of Malo Lupo!"

Zim sighed and rolled the talisman between his palms. Infomercials sounded like a good idea. They were excellent research and sometimes gave him brilliant new weapon ideas. He would watch infomercials for hours and eat chips when he got home. And wear soft pants.

* * *

Three days later.

Zim leaned back in the computer chair, folding his hands together.

The YouTube video was called "Alien Energy Fueled Haunting By Lady of Malo Lupo 100% Real Not Fake THE TRUTH!"

The top comments were:

kid taping this needs to stfu his voice makes me want to shoot a kitten

and

green chick is hott

Zim scrolled through the video by clicking at random places in the time bar. There was that horrible house, only in the video it looked the same way the whole time, broken down and crumbling and filled with dust. The injured woman didn't show up on film at all. The only things of interest on the tape were Zim and Dib- the latter enthusiastically narrating things that weren't happening and the former-

Zim flinched and picked up the phone, holding it up to his face. "I found the video," he said when Dib picked up the other end.

"Good! This is what happens when you interfere with my research, Zim. It just gives me more material!"

"Uh huh," Zim said, pinning the phone between the side of his head and his shoulder and typing into the comments box.

"We're closing in on you, you know. Me and my entire organization."

Zim doubted Dib really had an organization. He finished his comment and hit 'send'.

"Imagine a noose drawing around your neck except the noose is made up of determined men and women who've all pledged to ridding the world of genocidal alien scum..." Dib trailed off. Zim heard clicking noises. "Hey! They can see the video for themselves, you know. They know it's real. Leaving nasty comments won't help you."

Zim shrugged a little.

Dib started typing. "Why haven't you been in school, anyway?"

Zim said nothing. Something black moved at the edge of his vision, or appeared to move. He did not turn his head to look in its direction.

"Hey..." Dib stopped typing. "You got what you wanted, didn't you?"

"What?"

"You followed me to that house because you wanted attention!"

"What? No."

"Oh, come on," Dib said. "You do it every time I take a break from investigating you. Suddenly, I turn around and there you are, popping up like a weed."

"I don't..."

"Get lonely being evil, Zim? I guess it's hard to make friends when you're planning on killing everyone, overthrowing your leaders and taking control of everything in the universe. When you're not even good at ruling stuff."

THAT plan was PRIVATE. Zim sputtered.

Dib kept talking. He never stopped TALKING. "Thing is it's... really not my fault that you're not good with people. Find someone less important to bother, okay?"

He hung up.

Zim put the phone down. His chest heaved.

That was all very well for Dib. Humans came with built-in partial genetic copies that were, for the most part, pre-programmed to feel attachment to each other. Dib had no concept of what it was like to be...

((alone))

Ridiculous. Irkens didn't care about such things.

Zim sucked the lining of his lower lip in between his teeth and nibbled it a little. He felt a crease form between his eyebrows.

((you have me))

Zim closed his eyes. "Leave me alone."

((you thought i could only stay in my house))

The voice of the ghost was definitely changing. She had the capacity now to sound pleased, rather gloating and obnoxious, actually.

Zim snatched up the talisman from the desk. The voice went silent.

There was a sticky, cold layer of sweat on his forehead.

"He'll pay," Zim said aloud, to no one. He liked the sound of his own voice. He liked hearing it every so often.

"He'll pay for this."


End file.
